Having set my mind at rest in Part 1 that my new lens wasn’t totally dodgy, I set about trying to make it even better. In fact, I decided to repeat the process on all three of my main lenses. (more…)
Posts Tagged ‘Capture One’
Canon Lens Auto Focus Accuracy – Part 2
Sunday, August 21st, 2011Canon Lens Auto Focus Accuracy – Part 1
Sunday, August 14th, 2011Back in May I wrote about the new Canon 70-200mm f4 L IS lens I had chosen and my reasons for making the choice I did. After taking it out on a few non-critical sessions I haven’t been blown away by its sharpness – it’s good, but perhaps not quite as crisp as I was hoping for. I started wondering if this was down to my unrealistic expectation or if there was something wrong with the lens.
Then one day I was out on the riverbanks in Durham and saw a heron fishing in the shallows. I was a bit far away, but thought I’d grab a few frames just for interest. Reviewing the shots I’d just taken zoomed in on the camera’s LCD, the heron was clearly blurred even though I was absolutely certain I had auto-focused on the body (I was too far away to pick up the eye which I would normally aim for). What was more, the detail in the background was sharp – and it was consistent, shot after shot. Suddenly I panicked – did my new lens have a serious back-focus problem?
The shot that started it: after default sharpening in Capture One, this Heron still looked soft while background details look sharp (100% crop)
New PC for Photo Processing
Monday, June 13th, 2011Sorry I’ve been short on posts lately, my attention’s been divided between some building work (and the resulting decorating) at home and the arrival of a new PC. I previously talked about adding life to my old PC by clearing out shots that I didn’t need to keep and that certainly spun it out for a few months. But lately Windows XP has developed a problem with one of the processes that’s caused it to grind to a halt on too many occasions. It may well be repairable by reinstalling XP, but I came to the conclusion that the computer’s had a good life (about 8 or 9 years) and any investment of time and/or money in trying to keep it going any longer was probably going to just suck up valuable resources without any significant long-term benefit and that it was time to bite the bullet and order a new one.
The new machine is well-stocked, with a 15.6 inch B+RGLED screen, Inte Core i5 processor, 6GB RAM, 750GB 7,200rpm hard disk, Windows 7 and plenty of connectivity including HDMI and USB 3.0. No matter how good a computer is, there’s always an amount of setting up you need to do to get it how you want it – installing software (“Now, where did I put that licence key? Oh yes, carefully filed with all the others…”) and transferring data (“I didn’t realise I had that much in there”). Of course, when you’ve got a new toy to play with you just want to get on with it and dive in! But I’ve been good, I’ve been restrained and I’ve got everything set up how I want it first. Well, more or less 
Yesterday I processed my first set of pictures which were ones from the Trossachs, hopefully to be included on some websites of the area soon. I was really impressed with how blisteringly fast the new machine is! I’m also enjoying exploring the features of Capture One v6 Pro which is a significant upgrade from the previous version I was using.
As well as adding a few more images to the galleries from recent shoots, I’m hoping to get some shots from a session in the Lake District in a couple of weeks. My biggest hope is that we get decent weather on the fells and the chance of some sunset / sunrise pics. More to come…
Capture One 6 released
Friday, December 3rd, 2010Scottish Fellwalk – post processing workflow
Friday, October 8th, 2010Durham Cathedral and Memorial
Thursday, July 8th, 2010Well, last weekend didn’t go quite as planned. I had hoped to get over to the Lake District on Sunday for my first hill walk of the year but the weather conspired against me. I didn’t much fancy the advertised 80 mph gusts on the tops, especially when they were going to be covered in cloud anyway! I would have tested my new bag system too, but that will have to wait for another day. (more…)
